Simply Addictive!

Here’s another thought I’ve been sitting with, especially after the conversation with Syeda Tabinda Bukhari last week. And I know others have discussed this topic before. I’ve been thinking about those hours between Fajr and the official start of our day. The three hours that stretch quietly between prayer and school drop-offs, between a spiritual rise and a societal delay.

By 2 pm, we could be done! Free to rest, to spend time with family, and to create.
What are we doing with that time? In the Muslim world, we’re expected to rise before dawn. We’re already up. We’re already awake. We’ve already started. But then… we wait for the rest of the world to catch up, and for schools to open and for offices to unlock. For life to begin at 6:30, 7:30, or 8 am.

That is, if we stay up. Some do. Maybe they head to the gym. Go out for a run. Get a head start on house chores (the laundry, last night’s dishes, that cupboard you’ve been avoiding all week). Others just crawl back into bed… and wake up groggy as ever.
But really, who decided this rhythm? The 9-to-5 model is inherited. Imported. Built on a work culture that never accounted for our spiritual practices, right?
And yet here we are, organizing our days around it.

But what if the day began at 5:30 or 6? What if schools started early and ended early? What if we built our schedules around our own rhythm, not someone else’s?
Would we be more balanced or would we just find new ways to stay up late and still wake up tired? And of course, this won't just be about work, it has to be everyone, the whole system for it to work.. It’s too big to shift unless everyone shifts together. 

But still, I wonder. What would it look like to live on a rhythm that’s truly ours?